Caste is centre stage as parties gear up for the battle of 2024
In a year’s time we face a general election and the caste cauldron is simmering once again. The Bihar chief minister was the first to stir the pot by seeking a caste survey in the state. He even got a Supreme Court endorsement for the exercise. Needless to say, caste is the mainstay of Bihar politics. Not to be left behind, the government at the Centre is also going ahead with a socio-economic survey of caste, ostensibly to demarcate the creamy layer among the backward castes but essentially to study the sub-categorisation of the OBCs. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has decided not to let the opposition wrest the initiative in this caste calculus. He set up a commission in 2017 to find ways to ensure the equitable distribution of reservation benefits. The commission has suggested creating four sub-categories of all the OBCs availing reservation benefits. The expectation is the sub-categorisation may generate a new support base to the BJP from among the OBCs and help the ruling party in 2024.
The UPA had started a similar exercise in 2011 but they went out of power before they could complete it. Despite the promise of a New India in subsequent years, we continue to be entrenched deeply in caste identities and that continues to influence our electoral politics. As things stand, the opposition parties have affirmed the centrality of caste in their game plan by demanding a nationwide caste census.
The last census was conducted in 1931. The Mandal Commission, which gave 27% reservation to the backward classes, relied on data from the 1931 census. The OBC leaders from across the country demand a precise count of people belonging to the various backward castes in the same way the number of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes people is counted in the decennial census. The BJP has so far not accepted this particular demand. Nor has it released the report of the Socio-Economic and Caste Census in 2011, citing discrepancies in the data collected.
In Bihar, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar may have sought to put the BJP on the defensive by ordering the caste survey but that has had a cascading effect with backward leaders belonging to the opposition wanting a fresh enumeration of castes and re-fixation of the OBC quota. It is now a race for who emerges as a benefactor of the backward castes not just in the Hindi heartland but in other states as well.